Rebel MPs threatening to defeat Tony Blair's school reforms will be offered a £30 million sweetener this week in the form of new funding to improve struggling schools.

Ministers will pledge the money to encourage the twinning of good schools with poor performing neighbours, arguing that where this has been tried it has produced 'stunning' improvements in exam results. However, the last-minute offer is unlikely to buy off a revolt against plans to create trust schools freed from local authority control. With the education bill due to be published on Tuesday, whips say up to 110 Labour MPs may be ready to defy their leader.

While the Prime Minister has made clear he is prepared to rely on Tory votes to force through his plans, senior Conservatives admit some of their own backbenchers - angry that the bill does not offer enough freedoms and worried that it would prevent the creation of new grammar schools - could join the revolt.

'There are undoubtedly some people who are uncomfortable with our approach. There are some who are "up and at 'em" and think that the job of the official opposition is to oppose government, and there are others who say this bill is not as radical as the white paper and we shouldn't be supporting them,' said a senior frontbencher.

Blair and Education Secretary Ruth Kelly will hold meetings with rebel MPs tomorrow. But one senior backbencher closely involved in efforts to broker a deal said one now appeared unlikely: 'People are suspending their ammunition until the bill actually comes out because they want to see what it means. But I am less optimistic now than I was a while back that we can finesse this.'

Although Blair has won difficult votes on ID cards and terrorism, that meant MPs were 'saving themselves up' to rebel over education, he added.